In a conventional way of managing the growths of plants such as seedlings, selection of well-grown plants by visual observation of the appearances of the plants is performed, as well as growing, transplanting and harvesting of the plants. There have recently been inspection devices that inspect the growing conditions of plants based on data other than the appearances of the plants (see Patent Literature 1, for example), and there has been a demand for the use of such inspection devices to inspect the plants, select well-grown plants based on the resultant inspection data, and grow, transplant and harvest the plants.
In order to construct a system for executing a plurality of processing steps (a growing step, a transplantation step, and a harvesting step) using those inspection devices or the like, the plant management data such as the inspection data obtained through these processing steps need to be managed comprehensively, which brings an idea of installing a database such as the one described in Patent Literature 2.
FIG. 4 shows a plant management system 500 as a reference example of the system executing the plurality of processing steps (the growing step, the transplantation step, and the harvesting step), to which a database such as the one described in Patent Literature 2 is applied.
In the plant management system 500 shown in FIG. 4, plants P are planted in a tray 510 and grown in a germination and seedling warehouse 530. Thereafter, a plurality of the plants P housed in the tray 510 are inspected using an inspection device 541a, and the resultant inspection data are stored in an integrated database 581 of a host device 580 through an inspection terminal 541b. In this inspection step, a first reader 543 that is connected by a PLC 570 to the host device 580 reads a first barcode 513 attached to the tray 510, to specify the tray 510.
In the next transplantation step, the inspection data stored in the integrated database 581 are referenced and the plants P in the tray 510 are transplanted into a panel 520 by a transplantation robot 551a. In this transplantation step as well, a second reader 554 and a third reader 555 that are connected by the PLC 570 to the host device 580 read the first barcode 513 attached to the tray 510 and a second barcode 523 attached to the panel 520, to specify the tray 510 and the panel 520.
In the next harvesting step, a fourth reader 563 connected to the host device 580 reads the second barcode 523 attached to the panel 520, to specify the panel 520, followed by harvesting of the plants P.